KIRKUS REVIEW

Eighteen-year-old white tennis
phenom Dara is so good that her coach wants her to start competing in
tournaments, and she’ll need a passport—but her single mother, Mellie, is short
on cash and has no interest in supporting Dara’s tennis career.

Mellie insists she lost Dara’s birth
certificate, but one day after Mellie leaves for work, Dara finds it in a
locked box—along with other secrets that flip her world over. Her birth mother
was struck by a car and killed before Dara turned 1, and Mellie—her father—is
transgender and kept it all from Dara. Furious and hurt and accompanied by her
Indian-American best friend, Sam, Dara goes to find her birth mother’s family.
Mellie’s baffling series of lies to her daughter is revealed to have very good
reasons, and the story behind them unfolds in a series of emails Mellie sends
to Dara as she’s on the road. Dara is the main character, but Mellie is the
book’s heart, and she’s incredible: a complicated, soulful, talented, and
loving transwoman whose emails could be their own book. Verdi’s respect and
care are evident in every character in the book, no matter how brief their
appearance, especially boy-next-door Sam and Dara’s wealthy, ultraconservative
grandparents, who, although they do some terrible things, aren’t written off as
evil.

Verdi’s book is a triumph—an
exquisite mirror in which trans parents and their children will see themselves.
And for once, the reflection won’t break their hearts. (Fiction. 14-adult)

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